The Authoritarian Personality is an influential 1950 book by Theodor W. Adorno and and several other researchers working at UC Berkeley during WWII and the period shortly thereafter. Adorno and his collaborators postulated the existance of an "Authoritarian Personality" that was receptive to Authoritarianism. The researchers created an psychometric instrument for measuring (the F-scale) and developed a Freudian theory of the development of this personality type.

The Authoritarian Personality inspired sociology and political science research during the later 1950s and early 1960s, on the role of psychology/anxiety in political expression.